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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;Conder101, post: 803040, member: 66&quot;]Common misconception, Dr Sheldon NEVER created a grading system.&nbsp; The 1 to 70 point system was an observation of the PRICE ratios between 1794 lage cents in different grades.&nbsp; The coins had to be graded FIRST and then the price ratio would be applied based on what a coin of that particular variety in the lowest grade was worth.</p><p><br /></p><p>These price ratios has held true for some 25 years when Dr Sheldons book came out in 1949.&nbsp; He seems to have thought he had found some natural law that governed the values of the cents in the different grades.</p><p><br /></p><p>But the interest created by the book drew many more collectors into the field.&nbsp; Naturally since collectors tend to want better pieces this created more pressure on the better coins and the ratios changed.&nbsp; In the 1958 edition of his book Dr Sheldon introduced various &quot;correction factors&quot; into the mess to try to get the old ratios to work again.&nbsp; But even more collectors entered the field and now the ratios didn&#039;t work again either with or without the correction factors.&nbsp; </p><p><br /></p><p>After EAC came into existance in 1967, they spent several years trying to tweak the values and the correction factors to get the ratios to work again.&nbsp; Finally it was given up as a hopeless cause.</p><p><br /></p><p>Shortly after it was given up, the ANA adopted the &quot;Sheldon grading system&quot; and applied it to all coins.&nbsp; But it must be realized that the <b>numbers</b> are meaningless.&nbsp; They do not measure anything they are just another name or label.&nbsp; The only advantage they have is that they show the order the grades run in.</p><p><br /></p><p>Even there there was little reason for them.&nbsp; If you see the word grades written out About Good, Good, Very Good, Fine, Very Fine, Extremely Fine, is there really any doubt as to which is better than which?&nbsp; Do we have to put the 3, 4, 8, 12, 20, and 40 with them for you to know which is better?&nbsp; (And frankly if order is all that matters we could have used D, F, H, J, L, and N.&nbsp; It is just a label.)&nbsp; The only place where the number actually came in handy was in the Uncirculated grades.&nbsp; But only because the market kept adding new hype words and no one knew what order they belonged in.&nbsp; (Choice, Select, Gem,&nbsp; Superb) Plus the fact that different dealers used them in different order.&nbsp; The original &quot;system&quot; didn&#039;t have that problem as it only had three grades of Unc.&nbsp; Unc, Gem Unc, and Perfect.&nbsp; Pretty simple to see the order of those three. </p><p><br /></p><p>&quot;I don&#039;t know if a select is better than a choice, I can&#039;t define the difference and maybe can&#039;t even point out a difference between the two coins, but this one has a higher number so it must be worth more.&quot;&nbsp; Dreck.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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